


Battlegrounds

by calathea



Category: Wilby Wonderful (2004)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-23
Updated: 2009-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-05 01:57:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calathea/pseuds/calathea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They fought for the first time sixty-seven days after Dan left the hospital.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Battlegrounds

They fought for the first time sixty-seven days after Dan left the hospital. Sixty-three days after he had agreed to Duck's gentle suggestion that he stay longer, just for a little while, just until he was certain that he was feeling better. Forty-six days after staying meant sleeping in Duck's bed. Forty-one days after sleeping with Duck had come to mean having sex with Duck. Four days after Dan received the decree absolute that terminated his marriage forever. Two days after Duck told him, his lips restless against Dan's throat, to stay for as long as he wanted, to stay forever. They fought for the first time at three in the afternoon on a Saturday, seventy days after Dan decided he didn't really want to die.

In some cold and watchful part of his mind, he was relieved that at five o'clock on Saturday, seventy days later, he still didn't want to die.

* * * * * *

Dan remembers coming home from a dinner party with some of Val's friends one night, back when they still lived on the mainland. Part way through the evening, there had been a terrible, whispered fight in the kitchen, and the guests had been left marooned at the dinner table while stormy marital seas battered at their shores. Val confided smugly on the drive home that their glass-like calm, their perfect accord, made her the envy of her friends. She laughed indulgently at the assertion of one (jealous, she thought) acquaintance that they missed out on so much that way -- missed out on all the joys of making up. Dan just smiled at her in the darkness of the car, and did not flinch when she reached out to pat his cheek.

He doesn't remember who had the last word, the day after he was found at the Watch. He thinks it probably wasn't him.

* * * * * *

There is a photo album on one of the shelves in their bedroom. He looked at it once, idly, flicking through the pages while Duck was in the shower. He didn't feel he was trespassing, even when Duck came into the room and saw him. "The bad old days," was all Duck said, sitting on the edge of the bed and beginning to rub at his damp hair with a towel. Dan turned over another few pages. A younger Duck glared out of candid shots, skinny and sullen, his omni-present cigarette clutched in one hand. Sometimes another man would be with him, his arm around Duck's hunched shoulders. In one of the closer shots, you could see the ring of a partly faded bruise circling Duck's left eye, the little smirk on Duck's lips edged with cruelty.

Dan closed the album as Duck stood and walked over to him, unselfconsciously naked. "The bad old days," Duck said again, taking the book from Dan's hands and pushing it back onto the shelf. Duck's hair was cool and damp when Dan slid his fingers into it to deepen their kiss.

* * * * * *

Despite the chillier autumn weather, the windows of Duck's house are open, and the house smells of the ocean. There is no mark where Duck struck the wall with his fist.

Duck is out the back of the house, slouched on the ratty sofa they keep there. He does not look up when Dan pushes the back door open, but turns his cigarette packet over and over in one hand.

"I've got a temper. You know?" Duck says, finally, addressing the horizon, the looming bulk of the mainland.

Dan moves to sit beside him, follows his gaze out across the water. The sofa groans and creaks. Dan still feels raw and peeled, as though he has sloughed off a layer of skin. "I got the divorce papers through on Tuesday."

He hears a little rustling sound next to him as Duck nods, and slips the cigarettes back into his shirt pocket.

After a moment, Dan stretches his hand across the space that separates them. Instantly, Duck's hand is there, their fingers meshing. Duck's thumb strokes across the back of his hand.


End file.
